John Sterling has a memorable Memorial Day weekend
I generally avoid John Sterling bashing here, no matter how many e-mails I get from helpful readers tipping me off to his trademark moments.
Partly it's because this stuff loses a lot in translation from audio to text. Partly it's because this is an old story by now. Partly it's because I find Mr. Sterling mostly harmless and amusing.
But since I have a complete set of John moments to share, one from each day of the holiday weekend, and since I'm closing in on my monthly page views record and John is a reliable lightning rod, what the heck . . . click below for the aforementioned weekend fun.
Saturday: OK, Sterling had a right to be confused about this one. But it still was entertaining to hear him describe the strange situation in which home plate ump Larry Vanover called Adrian Beltre out to end the game on a strikeout, except that there only were two strikes on Beltre at the time.
"Strike three is called on the outside corner! Ballgame over! Yankees win. Thuuuh Yankees win! . . . Adrian Beltre just stayed at home plate. Am I wrong? Is the game over? Beltre is just staying there at home plate. Now the home plate umpire Larry Vanover goes out to talk to Molina and the game apparently is not over. The Yankees were shaking hands and celebrating and patting each other on the back, and was it a strike or not? Obviously it wasn't a strike. Music was playing. We heard 'Yankees win' from some fool in the booth. Don't ask. I have no idea. I have absolutely no idea."
Sunday: Jose Molina hit a big double that Ichiro Suzuki misplayed in centerfield. It was Molina, wasn't it?
"Here is Molina. Matsui at second with two out. The pitch swung on and hit in the air to right center. Ichiro going back, a way back in deep right center. It lands for a base hit! How do you like that? Matsui scores, Cano goes to second with a double. Oh, it's a ribbie double by Robbie Cano, don't you know, and the Yankees take the lead! A ribbie for Robbie! . . . Excuse me, that's Molina. What am I talking about?"
Monday: Johnny Damon was thrown out at home plate by the O's Nick Markakis, but evidently it looked as if he was going to be safe, apparently.
"[Damon] around third to score, the throw home is . . . in time! Damon is thrown out by the great arm of Nick Markakis. Beautiful throw by Markakis gets Damon on the slide. Beautiful, beautiful throw. I really thought Damon was going to score."
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Comments (10)
I love Sterling. I think he's absolutely hilarious. For me, listening to him is such a treat because I obviously watch most of the games on television. If I'm in the car and the game is on, I can't tune into 880 fast enough.
Andrew: I like that. A minority opinion, to be sure, but refreshing to hear a defense of JS for once.
I mean, I don't like him because of his broadcasting prowess, but rather his entertainment value.
I also like listening to John & Suzyan on the radio. You just have to laugh at his mistakes & live with it At least he can laugh at himself & admit he made a mistake. Some days it's part of the fun seeing if you can catch any mistakes. On Sunday he also said Jeter made a diving catch but he was upright.
Yeah, it's really entertaining to listen to an inaccurate description of the game from someone who's not really paying attention. Absolutely hilarious.
You have to go into the broadcast with a different mindset. You know you aren't going to be blown away with a great call of the game, so you might as well sit back and laugh at what you're listening to.
He should change his name back to Harold Moskowitz and start doing a stand-up routine in the Catskills.
How did you not use the call on sunday of Shelley Duncan hitting a line drive??
Sterling - "It's a line drive...oh it hit him. 5 or 6 seconds It hit im in the leg, boy I'd stand way back behind the coaching box. " If you were listening like I was, you had no idea WTF was going on.,
Sterling needs to go. He's had his 20 years, he doesn't watch the game or listen to his parners, the game has passed him by. The Yankees promote themselves as Tradition and excellence and they have a clown and a redsox fan doing the game on radio.
Nobody was happier than i was when Sterling had to leave NYC in the early 80's, he was awful then, and he humiliated every caller to his radio show, calling them idiots and morons under his breath while they were talking. There wasn't another sports-talk show in NY excep for WFUV-FM until 1985.
Nobody was more shocked than me when WABC brought him back to broadcast Yankees games. He wasn't any good in Atlanta and their standards were pretty low. I think this may be the year he finally gets fired, he's just too bad to be believed and I doubt he's popular with the listeners, as I read Yankees' officials claim over the years.
Sterling calling Yankee games is just..um.."special".
I'll leave it at that.